West Bank: 108 Hamas Members Arrested in Biggest Crackdown by Palestinian Forces

The Palestinian forces under President Mahmoud Abbas's Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) arrested 108 Hamas members in a series of overnight raids that started on Thursday night in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

The raids, termed as the largest security crackdown since 2007, were conducted in Hebron, Nablus and Bethlehem, The Times of Israel reported.

Some media reports claimed that several senior Hamas members were also arrested in the raids that began on Thursday morning and continued till Friday.

Hamas spokesperson Husam Badran told the The Palestinian Information Centre that the "crazy" security measures were undertaken by Palestinian Authority forces against Hamas in the West Bank were aimed at stopping the recent spate of attack against Israel.

In his statement, Badran noted that the Palestinian security forces were working for Israel and were carrying out the arrests at the behest of Israel. Hamas stated that it held President Mahmoud Abbas personally responsible for the "persecution and terror" campaign against its members.

Islamist Hamas controls the Gaza Strip and is a rival of Fatah, the movement headed by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas which is dominant in the West Bank. The two parties, however, had signed a formal reconciliation last year.

Adnan Al-Dmairi, spokesman for the Palestinian Authority told Reuters that the arrested Hamas members were planning "to sow chaos".

"We are arresting them for interrogation or to put them on trial based on evidence they are threatening Palestinian internal security stability and are trying to drag the region and drag us into military confrontation and destroy the area," Dmairi said.